Dissonant Works

Wednesday, May 20 Dissonant Works presents Small Room Session 05 LaDonna Smith, gabby fluke-mogul, Alex Cunningham, Jason Stein, Damon Smith, Adam Shead LaDonna Smith is a violinist, violist, and central figure in free improvisation whose decades of work span performance, collaboration, and artist-led organizing, including her long-running publication Trans Museq. gabby fluke-mogul is a Brooklyn-based violinist, improviser, composer, and organizer working across experimental and improvised music with an active international touring practice. Alex Cunningham is a St. Louis–based violinist, improviser, and visual artist. His recorded output spans free improvisation, drone, noise, and minimalist composition, with releases across a range of independent labels. Jason Stein — Damon Smith — Adam Shead (often billed as Stein/Smith/Shead) is a Chicago-rooted improvising trio uniting bass clarinetist Jason Stein, double bassist Damon Smith, and percussionist Adam Shead. Since forming in late 2021, the group has toured extensively across the Midwest and beyond, becoming a fixture in the creative music circuit and collaborating with influential figures such as Roscoe Mitchell and Marilyn Crispell. Doors 7:00 PM / Music 8:00 PM $20 - Tickets on sale at dissonantworks.org- link in bio *Late afternoon community workshop with LaDonna Smith to be announced

Sunday, May 17 7:00 PM (early show) Dissonant Works presents An evening of ambient pedal steel Luke Schneider (Nashville, TN), Nate Hofer (Kansas City), Mike Stover (Kansas City) Luke Schneider @lukefromnashville is a Nashville-based ambient pedal steel artist whose meditative, drone-based compositions transform the instrument’s traditional role into immersive sound. His releases on Third Man Records, Leaving Records, and Northern Spy position him within a contemporary experimental context. Nate Hofer @natehofer is a Kansas City–area artist working with ambient and experimental pedal steel guitar. His music blends improvisation and “accidental” composition, informed by Brian Eno and Buddy Emmons. His forthcoming solo release Decommissioned was recorded inside a decommissioned Atlas F missile silo near Wilson, Kansas. Mike Stover @stovey_stov is a Kansas City–based multi-instrumentalist, recently focused on pedal steel guitar, performing both classic country and less traditional work, including solo performances and collaborations with artists such as Lorna Kay. $20 Tickets at (link in bio)

Puppets! Friday May 15! Weavers of Webs, volume 2! The Weavers Of Webs series aims to showcase a new era of St. Louis puppetry alongside some of our area’s greatest freeform musicians and noise makers. Within the silks spun. you will find the celebration of pop culture laced with wit, wisdom, camp, trickery, and cynicism. All welcomed. this addition features Fiber Glass Insulation from Chicago, Fool’s Errand, Blaque Berry Puppets and The Hellbender Theatre $10/PWYC

May 27 8pm! Three solo acts, all pretty different from each other!(all experimental to be sure though 😉) With visuals by Kevin Harris @afterlife_laboratories , this is just a fun show! Twisted folkloric noise by Feverfew @beyondacid87 , circuit broken soundscapes by Jim McGowin @zmcgowin , and nylon string guitar explorations by Danny Pankratz @dannypandanny ! Kevin Harris will provide virtuosic imagery and visual manipulation.

Saturday, May 23! 7 pm, some jazz for ya!! Conspiracy Deliracy, the brainchild of St. Louis bassist and composer Andrew Binder, features original compositions crossed between modern jazz, pop music icons, their music, and conspiracy theories. The music is tongue-in-cheek commentary on today’s delusional era of misinformation, sensitively interpreted by some of the Midwest’s top jazz musicians.

Here’s a great overview of the Ladonna Smith trio show at @dissonantworks in this week critic’s picks in the St. Louis Magazine music newsletter. Thank you to @_bodyclock for the words and for letting me wax about 🎻🎻🎻. This will be one of the best shows of the year. Do not miss.

Wednesday, May 20 Dissonant Works presents Small Room Session 05 LaDonna Smith, gabby fluke-mogul, Alex Cunningham, Jason Stein, Damon Smith, Adam Shead LaDonna Smith is a violinist, violist, and central figure in free improvisation whose decades of work span performance, collaboration, and artist-led organizing, including her long-running publication Trans Museq. gabby fluke-mogul is a Brooklyn-based violinist, improviser, composer, and organizer working across experimental and improvised music with an active international touring practice. Alex Cunningham is a St. Louis–based violinist, improviser, and visual artist. His recorded output spans free improvisation, drone, noise, and minimalist composition, with releases across a range of independent labels. Jason Stein — Damon Smith — Adam Shead (often billed as Stein/Smith/Shead) is a Chicago-rooted improvising trio uniting bass clarinetist Jason Stein, double bassist Damon Smith, and percussionist Adam Shead. Since forming in late 2021, the group has toured extensively across the Midwest and beyond, becoming a fixture in the creative music circuit and collaborating with influential figures such as Roscoe Mitchell and Marilyn Crispell. Doors 7:00 PM / Music 8:00 PM $20 - Tickets on sale at dissonantworks.org- link in bio Join us for a free community workshop with LaDonna Smith at 5:00 pm

headed to St. Louis at the end of the month. Play the sick venue @dissonantworks with huck and @matt.daisyy . tell your friends!

We’ve got a great stretch of shows coming up through the second half of May. Back to back evenings of creative and improvised music starting this Thursday with Chicago trombonist Jeb Bishop. Sunday, May 17 features ambient pedal steel performances from Luke Schneider, Nate Hofer, and Mike Stover, followed by an open conversation on pedal steel and experimental approaches to the instrument. Wednesday, May 20 we continue our Small Room Session series with avant garde violinist LaDonna Smith alongside gabby fluke-mogul and Alex Cunningham, ending the night with the trio of Jason Stein, Damon Smith, and Adam Shead. Tickets available at dissonantworks.org Suggested donation $20 Sliding scale / PWYC always available. Thank you for continuing to support our organization. We’re grateful to keep bringing this work to St. Louis.

June 21 at Ddub!! Thomas Helton @thomasheltonbass , Richard Gilman-Opalsky @gilmanopalsky and Adam Larison come into town from Sundry Places, while Locals Dave Stone, Damon Smith @newmusicbass and Danny Pankratz @dannypandanny stay in town. Bass duos, guitar duos, classic free jazz combo sets, they’re all here for you More info in comments!! $20/pwyc

Friday May 29!! Big show rolling through! True Green’s name comes from medieval nun Hildegard of Bingen’s idea of viriditas, and also a lawn care company. Hail Disaster, the second album from Minneapolis-based band, is a darker, warmer follow up to their 2024 lofi debut My Lost Decade, exploring tragedies real and imagined, ranging from family cruelty (“Italian Lightning”), to the dark side of fandom (“Beatlemania”), doomed love (“Hamlet + Juliet”), and the death of Hornsby’s uncle from AIDS (“Terry’s Parrot”). Dan Hornsby, the principal songwriter of True Green, is also a novelist (his book Via Negativa is being adapted into a film starring Young Mazino) and True Green songs put his storytelling skills on full display. Matt Daisy (STL) is a twister of strange ballads and twangy melodic phrasing. Raised around bluegrass, they write songs with an earthy blend of pop/soul energy and experimental influence. Two parts pouring of the heart, and one part comedic relief, Matt hopes to be relatable and raw in their musings (both dark and light), and to spread the contagion of creativity through their abundant love of sound and heavy lyrical imagery. Huck (local schoolboy soft rock comprised of Jack Killeen, Cullen Drissell, Chris Endicott, and Andy Lewis) self-describes as “sweet, literary rock/pop from four school band friends” with songs written by Jack Killeen. Friday, May 29th Doors at 7:30PM Show at 8PM $20

June 12!! A Friday! What a treat of a show! Presenting three kinds of music for synthesizers: On Friday, June 12, Bridges, DiCenzo, and Behan will bring three distinct approaches to making music with synthesizers to Dissonant Works. Each artist draws from wide-ranging musical experiences, diverse compositional methods and performance practices, to reveal their unique relationships to sound, time, and listening … Duane Bridges will perform human-based, post-ambient music from the new LP Modes of Impermanence, exploring memory, improvisation, repetition, dissonance, and temporal structures. Limited edition vinyl copies of Modes of Impermanence will be available, as this show is also a demarcation of the album’s release date (June 12) … Justin DiCenzo creates deep analog ambient reflections of circadian rhythms against an LED dystopia of constant stimulus while improvising against the grain of modernity … Joseph Behan will be using the modular synthesizer, found sounds and unequal temperaments to create an immersive sonic landscape … Doors at 7:30, Show at 8:00 $20, or pay what you can